A Corpus Study Of Four-word Lexical Bundles In Chinese EFL Learners’ Spoken And Written English

Up to now,a considerable number of researches have been conducted on the multi-word units(MWUs),as they are the important building blocks of discourse.Appropriate and fluent use of MWUs contribute to accurate and proficient written and spoken production.Different from other types of word combinations,lexical bundles are frequency-driven word combinations,which are characterized by incomplete structure,yet different functional discourse performance.The present study applies a hybrid of corpus-based and corpus-driven approach to identifying and analyzing frequently-used four-word lexical bundles produced by Chinese learners of English as a foreign language(EFL)in Chinese Learner English Corpus(CLEC)and Spoken English Corpus of Chinese Learners(SECCL).The study uses the Word Smith to extract the four-word lexical bundles in the corpora,which are viewed as candidates.Together with manual operation,target bundles are obtained from those candidate bundles based on several criteria.Based on the previous researches by Biber et al.(1999)and Biber,Conrad&Cortes(2004),the target bundles are investigated in terms of the structure and function across registers.The Chi-square test(χ~2)is applied to examine whether the differences between spoken and written English are statistically significant.The present study attempts to investigate the differences and similarities of the use of four-word lexical bundles by Chinese EFL learners across registers.The results show that(1)the four-word lexical bundles by Chinese EFL learners are more common in spoken production than those in written production;(2)with regard to the structures,a high proportion of lexical bundles incorporate verb phrases in both registers.It is also noted that lexical bundles in written register contain a large number of personal pronouns and modal verbs,which might show that lexical bundles used in writing by Chinese EFL learners have a tendency of verbalization;(3)the use of lexical bundles by Chinese EFL learners’written and spoken English shows big differences in their reliance on particular functional types.The learners use more stance bundles in spoken production,while discourse organizers are the most common word sequences in written production;and(4)the use of lexical bundles by Chinese EFL learners is not diversified in both registers.The acquisition of lexical bundles can improve the fluency,accuracy and appropriateness of English learners’language production,promote English learners’proficiency of understanding of language context and register variation,and finally enhance English learners’communicative ability.In order to make their oral and written English production more native-like,Chinese EFL learners need to understand and master the structures and functions of lexical bundles in both spoken and written registers and appropriately and accurately use lexical bundles across registers in terms of the structures and functions.